Missing in Action

Abstract

In 1930, Ida B. Wells-Barnett was surprised and disappointed to find that, despite her pioneering role as an anti-lynching activist and a founder of the NAACP, her name was not included in a contemporary Black history text by Carter G. Woodson, the “Father of Negro History.” This essay interrogates the social and political forces, beyond conventional racism and sexism, that marginalized Wells-Barnett’s place in history.